The Crystal Ribbon

by Celeste Lim

  I replayed all those times I’d spent with Koko, whatever I could remember about him. So that was why he refused to repeat my name in front of Yunli.

  “I liked you a lot,” the bird continued. “And felt simply dreadful when I saw that my escape had caused you pain. Therefore, even after I left, I stayed close, waiting for you. Because I knew one day you’d escape.”

  “But…but how did you know I was going to do that?”

  He shrugged his wings. “You may call it animal instincts, I guess. In any case, I believe you’ve landed yourself in a bit of a situation, am I not right?”

  I nodded. “Yes. I’m on my way home to Huanan, and I got lost.”

  “Well now, I reckon my services may be of some help here.” Koko flexed his wings and took flight, landing on a branch overhead. “Part of any jing’s spiritual training to attain divinity is to accumulate positive chi through doing good deeds. So in order to become a deity, Li Jing, I have decided to stick with you and help you. I shall be your friend, or in our current situation, your compass.”

  I wasn’t about to argue against such a wonderful idea, but Koko went on persuading me anyway.

  “The forest is filled with danger and jing of all kinds! Snake, tree, centipede jing…” Koko shuddered. “But worry not, for the Divine Triller of Xuanji will get you out of here in no time!”

  “Wait, isn’t your name Koko?”

  The nightingale chirped indignantly and took flight. “That is a silly pet name your father-in-law gave me. And thankfully, not my true name. And the Divine Triller of Xuanji is only my jing title. Don’t you know? Jing never reveal our true names.”

  “But why?”

  “It poses a certain sort of danger for us.”

  I tilted my head. So that was why Sisi had asked for a nickname instead.

  “Well, I think Koko is a nicer name than the Divine Triller of Xuanji,” I said, patting his little head.

  “It’s the Divine Triller of Xuanji!”

  Whatever.

  Koko was as good as his word. It was fast approaching dusk the next day when we finally left the forest and managed to cross over to the next mountain. The path we were on had grown narrower, marked only by the wheel ruts from the carts of traders who traveled frequently between Baihe and Xiawan.

  I was about to suggest that we light a fire and rest for the day when we heard a sudden yell, and then a volley of barking. The noise seemed to have come from farther down the road. Someone was in trouble.

  “Let’s go see what it is.” I ran off even though Koko yelled at me to mind my own business.

  What soon met our eyes was a boy, hardly older than myself, encircled by a pack of wild dogs—five of them! The dogs seemed to have gone completely mad, barking and snapping alternately at the boy’s heels. He had a dagger in his hands and was holding it out as he tried to fend the dogs off.

  “Tian, ah! We have to help him!” I cried.

  “If you ask me, we should run before the dogs decide we’d make a better meal.”

  Glad I didn’t ask. I found a dead branch off the side of the road and set it alight with lamp oil. Carrying the burning branch, I let out a cry and advanced slowly toward the dogs, gripping the branch more tightly than was necessary.

  The beasts turned and saw me with the dangerous-looking torch. They began to hesitate and whimpered as I waved the burning branch from side to side in a threatening manner.

  “G-Get away! Go on…! Off with you!”

  At another wave of the flaming branch, the dogs abruptly turned and ran off in the other direction. I let out the breath I hadn’t realized I had been holding and drove my end of the torch deep into the snow on the roadside. It wouldn’t do to lose this flame, for I had little oil left for the journey.

  The boy stood there in silence, staring at me but still holding on to his dagger, and it was only then that I realized I was looking at the most peculiar human I had ever seen in my life. The boy had hair that shone the same shade as the golden sun behind him, and huge, deeply set eyes that were the color of imperial jade—not light, not dark, but a rich, sparkling green.

  Was he some sort of celestial sprite or deity that had descended from the heavens? He looked so otherworldly. But I shook my head.

  Silly Huli Jing! Just because a person looks peculiar doesn’t necessarily mean he fell from the sky!

  I hurried over. “Are you hurt? If you are, I have some medicinal balm that might help.” I held out a small jar, but the boy shook his head. He had suffered no injury, it seemed. He sheathed his dagger and then pointed at my forearms, indicating the scratches I had gotten while handling the branch.

  “Oh, that’s nothing. I’ll fix it in a wink.” I dabbed a bit of the ointment onto the wounds. The scratches were long, but very shallow. Not a big deal. “My name is Jing. What is yours?” There was a moment’s silence, and just when I was beginning to think the boy wasn’t going to answer me, he replied.

  “Kaizhen.”

  What an unusual name. But I shouldn’t be too surprised. This boy was probably a traveler from somewhere far away, which would also explain his curious appearance. Chang Er had spoken of foreign traders coming to China, especially to big cities like Dongjing, and some had the most curious features.

  “These men are huge and tall like giants,” Chang Er had related to the courtesans after returning from one of her trips to the imperial city. “They have fuzz on their arms as curly as dried tea leaves, and some have the most bizarre hair, as golden as this bangle on my wrist! And I once entertained a man who had eyes the color of the morning sky. I couldn’t stop staring at him and nearly embarrassed myself in front of the magistrate!”

  Although I had never seen such peculiar people, I probably shouldn’t make a big deal of it, in case it made me look silly and ignorant. I invited Kaizhen to share our bonfire and told him that if he needed someplace to rest for the night, it made sense to stick together out in this wilderness, at least for the night, anyway. Who knew whether those dogs might return?

  Koko, however, was not immediately agreeable to this idea. He did not trust the boy enough to reveal that he was a jing, so I introduced him as a tame nightingale pet. But this tame nightingale pet sure had a lot to say about that night’s plans!

  “I tell you, it’s a bad idea!” Koko hissed at me when we were out of earshot.

  “I don’t see how it can be.” I crossed my arms. “It’s too dangerous for anyone to be out alone. Especially a young kid.”

  “There’s just something about him, Jing,” said Koko, hopping restlessly back and forth across the branch of an oak tree.

  Hmm, Koko must’ve been thrown off by Kaizhen’s exotic appearance. “There are many humans from foreign lands who look different than what you’re used to seeing, Koko,” I began, feeling quite knowledgeable and pleased with myself until another thought struck me. “Unless…you’re thinking he might be a jing?” It was unlikely, but not impossible.

  Koko neither nodded nor shook his head, which unsettled me even more. “There are extremely powerful jing out there that are able to conceal their aura and take completely human forms. And when they do, they are nearly indistinguishable from normal human beings. Even a fellow jing wouldn’t be able to tell them apart,” he said.

  At that, I remembered the baigu jing during the Ghost Festival—the powerful White Lady who looked completely human, except for her skeleton hands. How powerful must a jing be to be able to appear entirely human and mingle among people undetected?

  “Although from pure instincts I can feel this boy has no malevolent intentions, there’s still something about him I can’t quite put my feather on.” Koko flapped his wings once for emphasis. “The question is, if he were a jing as we suspect, why is he in disguise?”

  “But what if he isn’t one? If you don’t feel he means us any real harm, wouldn’t it just be too cruel to send a helpless boy on his way like that?” My own time of solitude in the woods before I found Koko had been terrifying, and I wo
uldn’t wish for another person to go through the same experience.

  Koko sighed and shook his head. “I’m just trying to be cautious. But perhaps you are right. Maybe I’m being a little too wary.”

  And that was how the three of us came to spend the evening together.

  The boy had nothing at all except the simple clothes he wore, a fabric pouch, and the dagger hanging from the sash at his hips, so I offered him some of our food and insisted on sharing my cloak, though he did not seem very bothered by the cold in the first place. “It’s big enough for the both of us.” I sat down next to him and pulled the cape over our legs.

  Kaizhen didn’t speak much at all and did not touch his half of the pork bun I offered him. He was gazing at me with his extraordinary eyes. I looked away, rubbing the mole on my forehead, and attempted to make conversation, since I couldn’t very well expect Koko to break the ice.

  I bit into my half of the bun while Koko pecked at the crust from his perch on my wrist. “So where are you headed?” It took a while for me to realize that Kaizhen wasn’t going to answer my question. But the good thing was that he finally began to eat. Maybe I should try another one.

  “Where are you from?”

  Still no answer. Perhaps those questions came off a little too personal? I pressed my lips together and lapsed into silence. The flames from our bonfire lit up Kaizhen’s already fair skin and created dancing shadows of a strange kind among the trees behind him. I could make out the flickering silhouette of what seemed like something with pointy ears…and—

  “What about you?”

  I jumped a little. Kaizhen had stopped eating and was looking at me, waiting for an answer.

  “Where are you from? And where are you going?” He rephrased his questions.

  There was no compelling reason to hold back information like he had, so I told, and soon I was telling him many more things. He learned about my marriage, the Guos, Jun’an, my letter, and then the chinglou, and never once interrupted. Before we realized, it was already late into the night. The fire had burned down a little, and Koko had tucked his tiny head under his left wing on the branch above us and fallen asleep.

  “So now I’m finally going home.” I lowered my voice as I leaned back against the maple-tree trunk behind us. Yes, I was going home, and at the thought, a familiar knot of anticipation formed in my stomach.

  Soon. If I kept up my pace, very soon, I would be able to see them again. I’d be able to hug Baba, cuddle Zhuzhu in my arms, kiss Wei on the forehead, and finally live with my family again. Without really thinking, my hand went to my left wrist, but it was bare. “They even took my bangle from me. It was the only memento I had of my dead mother.”

  Kaizhen finally spoke. “Perhaps you might get it back someday.”

  For a moment, I had thought he was just saying it on a whim, but when I saw the seriousness in his eyes, I believed him. “Thank you.” I beamed.

  Suddenly, he reached over for my hands. My face grew hotter than if I’d stuck it right into a burning hearth. But Kaizhen’s eyes lost their softness as they examined my fingers. The scars from Mrs. Guo’s horrible zanzhi still looked ugly and fresh in the orange firelight. I drew my hands back and tried to sit on them. “These are permanent, I’m afraid,” I laughed. “But they don’t hurt anymore.” Then I snuggled farther into my cloak and turned the other way. “Let’s sleep; I’m tired.”

  Kaizhen said nothing, and I listened to him poking at the fire. Then I must have drifted off. The cold didn’t bother us that night, and I slept so comfortably that it felt as though I was in my own bed back home.

  I had been sure that Koko intended to continue hiding the fact that he was a jing, which was why I was pleasantly surprised when he decided to give himself away the very next morning.

  We were getting ready to go, and I had asked again where Kaizhen was headed. He pointed toward the sun. “It’s much farther than Baihe, where I’m headed, but it’s eastward nonetheless,” he said as he put out our fire. Actually, Kaizhen might not have been that shocked if Koko hadn’t hopped up behind him when he least expected and suddenly spoke in his loud, squeaky voice.

  “Then why don’t you come with us?”

  I laughed as Kaizhen jumped and spun around, dagger in hand. When he saw that it was only Koko, his emerald gaze went from fiercely alert to puzzled and then surprised.

  “You’re a jing,” he said.

  As the three of us made our way down the road, I looked up at Koko flying over our heads. “So why did you reveal yourself, Koko?”

  “Well,” he began, flying in quick circles, which often indicated that he was in a good mood, “I figured since we’ll be stuck together for a while, I can’t very well continue acting dumb. Especially considering how you have such a penchant for getting into trouble.”

  I did not bother to argue, and turned to Kaizhen. “You don’t seem as surprised as I was when I found out Koko was actually a jing.”

  “The Divine Triller of Xuanji, if you don’t mind.” Koko landed on my head and stomped on it. He still hadn’t tired of correcting me whenever he could. “I have my own pride as a jing and will not degrade myself by adopting some silly pet name a human gave me. If word got out to other jing, I would be a laughingstock for at least a thousand years!”

  “But this isn’t practical at all,” I argued. “Think about it. If you’re staying with me, we are going to be around humans a lot…and if I used that peculiar title in front of others, it would surely expose your identity, would it not?”

  “Fine, I allow you to use that silly name in front of humans.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Koko, I am not going to bother switching your name around under different circumstances for the sake of your pride.” I turned back to Kaizhen. “So where were we?”

  “You were asking why I didn’t seem surprised to learn Koko’s true identity. The truth is I’ve run into many jing on my travels. I have since learned to be wary of living beings in general, human or animal, which was why I did not reveal where I was headed until just now,” he said. “And besides, the bird’s eyes betray him. They belong to a creature more intelligent than one with a simple bird brain.”

  “True as it may be,” Koko huffed, “I won’t have you demeaning my lesser kinfolk.”

  I couldn’t help the smile spreading across my face. My chest felt light and bubbly, and I walked as though there were springs attached to my feet. I had a new traveling companion, had found a lifelong friend in Koko, the Divine Triller of Whatever, and was on my way home. Could things get any better?

  Nearing evening the next day, Koko gave an exuberant tweet in the air above us.

  “I see a human settlement not too far ahead.”

  Although the weather had been pleasantly mild after the awful storm a couple of days ago, it’d still be wonderful to make a stop at a village. “We could spend a night and stock up on food and even some oil for my lantern,” I said. Although Kaizhen seemed a little uncertain about the idea, he nodded his consent.

  Since joining us on our journey, he had become more comfortable with disclosing information about himself. We learned that he was thirteen, and had come from a far northwestern province. He was the son of a traveling trader who had fallen ill with a rare disease on one of their voyages, so Kaizhen had to travel on his own down to one of the major cities in the east to procure some rare herbs prescribed by their local medicine man.

  “Hejian,” he said.

  “That’s a long way away,” I gasped. “I think it’s almost another fortnight’s journey on horse cart from Baihe town.”

  Kaizhen shrugged nonchalantly. “I’m used to traveling. Been on these roads quite a few times with my father.”

  “Oh,” I nodded. “I was worried that you might be heading farther north. My father says the Jurchens invade our northern borders too often for it to be safe. Hejian is a fine place, though.” Talking about other places gave me a fluttering feeling in the stomach. How wonderful it’d be to spend one’s
life exploring so many new and unknown places far away. As a simple farmer’s daughter, the farthest I had been from my own village was only Xiawan. And Xiawan, from the stories I’d heard, was nowhere even nearly as exciting as places like Hejian, one of the biggest cities in the northeast, and the imperial city of Dongjing. Next to Kaizhen, I was like a frog who’d lived its entire life in a well.

  Before long, we arrived at a village that, at first glance, did not seem much larger or different from Huanan. The wooden sign just next to the gates told us that this was Daolin village.

  “It would be wonderful if we could stay here for the night,” I said. How nice to have a roof over our heads after so many days of sleeping out in the open.

  “We’ll need to ask permission from the village chief,” said Kaizhen.

  From just a brief walk around the place, we could tell that this community thrived on farming, for the village was set in a valley, and so had plenty of water needed for irrigation. But because it was winter and planting could not begin until spring, as we wandered the outskirts of the village, we saw that the large square patches of farmland were bare and covered in a thin layer of snow. Like Huanan, the agricultural community earned their keep from livestock and other work during winter.

  Most of the huts closer to the outskirts were blacksmithing forges. The work made a lot of noise, but the open furnaces created so much heat that it felt pleasant walking by them. As we moved closer to the main street, huts thinned out into stalls that flanked the barely cleared road, leading to the village center. The numerous wooden stalls sold mainly food, farming tools, livestock, and warm clothing made from animal skins. Although many villagers couldn’t help staring at Kaizhen’s uncommon appearance, they were pleasant and polite enough not to point it out. I looked at Kaizhen out of the corner of my eye. Although he remained vigilant and careful, he didn’t seem bothered by the curious stares. But there was something else. I could be wrong, but something felt slightly amiss in this place.